Playthrough with party and NPC

CaptainTingTang

Hi,

I'm trying to decide on my party for my next playthrough (first playthrough with EE). I was hoping I could use the 'Create Party' option to use some premade characters and still use some of the NPCs along the way, as I really can't decide on just one player character to use.

But, it seems like you cannot drop a premade char from your party and recruit them again later on, they cannot be talked to. I like to do a lot of changing and moving party members around throughout the game and this bug would mean that my initial premade characters would need to be in my party throughout.

So, suggestions on a minimal interesting party of premades, and suggestions of complementing them with the best NPCs would be good.

I'd like to try Dwarven Defender, Shaman, Shadowdancer, Sun Soul Monk, Archer amongst others, and there simply arent enough slots in my party for these, Imoen, Minsc (he is a must have!) and any other amusing and entertaining NPCs.

Help me choose please

Ravenslight

I believe that the BGII Tweaks mod (now Tweaks Anthology) has an option to have premade party members wait for you. I don’t know if it still works with all the changes that have been made to the game.

vyvexthorne

Yeah, tweaks anthology works well and is getting constantly updated.

As for party selections.. I've weirdly never done a mix and match of pre-made and npc's. It's always been all or nothing for me.
I guess it depends on who you really, really like as NPC's. (should they really be called npc's? How about apc's.. additional playable characters.) Minsc obviously is the stand out character.. Imoen only really feels important because of BG2. Before BG2 came out she was someone you could easily drop.

The first party I ever played with and thusly my favorite characters because of this are.
Ajantis
Branwen
Kivan
Garrick
Imoen - (immediately turned into a mage because I played a rogue.)

(to me, this is the canon party :P)

However, if I make up my own party.. I tend to quickly fall in love with whatever personalities I've made up for them in my head and find it pretty easy to skip out on picking up npc's.

If making up a mix and match I'd have to really decide on which npc's to take with me. .. And like you, there's so many "new" classes to try out that making up a party now gets really hard. Basically that's sort of what the Black Pitts come in handy for.

I guess, if I were going to do it.. I'd choose to make three characters.
Shadowdancer (me.. rogue, I am addicted and have a problem and need to always play a rogue of some sort.)
Shaman
Skald.

Then I'd take:
Imoen - immediately classed to mage.
Kivan
Branwen.

alceryes

vyvexthorne said:

I guess, if I were going to do it.. I'd choose to make three characters.
Shadowdancer (me.. rogue, I am addicted and have a problem and need to always play a rogue of some sort.)

I regularly play a rogue as well. You do it because they are awesome - 'nuff said!

CaptainTingTang

vyvexthorne said:

Yeah, tweaks anthology works well and is getting constantly updated.

As for party selections.. I've weirdly never done a mix and match of pre-made and npc's. It's always been all or nothing for me.
I guess it depends on who you really, really like as NPC's. (should they really be called npc's? How about apc's.. additional playable characters.) Minsc obviously is the stand out character.. Imoen only really feels important because of BG2. Before BG2 came out she was someone you could easily drop.

The first party I ever played with and thusly my favorite characters because of this are.
Ajantis
Branwen
Kivan
Garrick
Imoen - (immediately turned into a mage because I played a rogue.)

(to me, this is the canon party :P)

However, if I make up my own party.. I tend to quickly fall in love with whatever personalities I've made up for them in my head and find it pretty easy to skip out on picking up npc's.

If making up a mix and match I'd have to really decide on which npc's to take with me. .. And like you, there's so many "new" classes to try out that making up a party now gets really hard. Basically that's sort of what the Black Pitts come in handy for.

I guess, if I were going to do it.. I'd choose to make three characters.
Shadowdancer (me.. rogue, I am addicted and have a problem and need to always play a rogue of some sort.)
Shaman
Skald.

Then I'd take:
Imoen - immediately classed to mage.
Kivan
Branwen.

wow thanks for the useful advice. I'll check out the tweaks anthology too.

Ive never used Imoen as my main mage by dualling her instantly. Do her abilities get carried over to BG2 properly in EE? That would certainly solve my main issue, which is that I like having her for story reasons, but she's not a very good thief or mage.

alceryes

She starts as a Thief 7/Mage 8 in BGII, regardless of what you do in BGI.
There may be a mod that keeps her level distribution true to your BGI import, but frankly, there's no benefit to keeping her true if you dual her right away - you'd be the same level mage but WITHOUT any thief abilities. The mod (if it exists) is really for those who want to keep her as a thief longer for better thief abilities, deadlier traps, etc.

CaptainTingTang

vyvexthorne said:

I guess, if I were going to do it.. I'd choose to make three characters.
Shadowdancer (me.. rogue, I am addicted and have a problem and need to always play a rogue of some sort.)
Shaman
Skald.

Then I'd take:
Imoen - immediately classed to mage.
Kivan
Branwen.

Just thinking about yourt party suggestion here. You dont seem to have a tank, or are you thinking of using Kivan as your tank?

OrlonKronsteen

@CaptainTingTang I'm facing a similar dilemma, as I'm not fond of the good mage and cleric options for BG1 and SOD. As for your situation, I guess you should narrow things down. It sounds like Minsc and Imoen are essential for you, correct? And what class is your Charname going to be? After that, maybe just decide what other roles you need or want to fill and create characters from there?

ChaosRider

Cavalier - Human
Cleric/Warrior - Half Orc (19 str, you don't have to look for 18/00)
Swashbuckler- Half Orc
For a tanker you can get one of these below:
Dwarven Defender - Dwarv (hammer/axes ++++, other only ++)
Berserker - Half Orc (AGAIN >.> ?) - why not barbarian? I prefer grand mastery in weapons (+++++) than only specialization (++).

4 characters to have 2 slots free for npcs which are required to do some quests.

CaptainTingTang

Thanks for your suggestions! Cavalier is something I hadn't considered, and looks like a powerful class. I'm considering it for my PC in the next run now.

On a side note, yes I'd like Minsc but is it possible to take him without Dynaheir?

OrlonKronsteen

CaptainTingTang said:

On a side note, yes I'd like Minsc but is it possible to take him without Dynaheir?

They are saddled together, unfortunately. You can separate them by killing one of them (or allowing one of them to be killed), or by leaving one in a cave or building you don't plan to visit again and then removing them from the group when the rest of your party has left said cave or building (doing this prevents the 'leaving group' dialogue that would prevent the pair from splitting). This doesn't always feel right, however, and it could be problematic if you're continuing onto SOD, as I assume you'll find them paired there again.

CaptainTingTang

Thanks all. I think I settled on the following Good aligned party for my first ever go at Insane difficulty:


Half Orc Priest of Lathander (Main)
Dwarven Defender
Elf Mage

Imoen (left as a pure utility thief)
Minsc

Leaving one slot for picking up randoms and doing quests. Hopefully I can get rid of Dynaheir without too much trouble.

alceryes

For some reason, immediately after being rescued, Dynaheir always runs up the stairs behind her pit and attacks the three gnolls there with her fists - she's funny like that.

Leokosta

CaptainTingTang said:

Hi,

But, it seems like you cannot drop a premade char from your party and recruit them again later on, they cannot be talked to. I like to do a lot of changing and moving party members around throughout the game and this bug would mean that my initial premade characters would need to be in my party throughout.

If u have the console enabled, u can point the mouse to any NPC in the game, including your premade chars, and press CTRL + Q . It will add that NPC to your party

CaptainTingTang

Leokosta said:

CaptainTingTang said:

Hi,

But, it seems like you cannot drop a premade char from your party and recruit them again later on, they cannot be talked to. I like to do a lot of changing and moving party members around throughout the game and this bug would mean that my initial premade characters would need to be in my party throughout.

If u have the console enabled, u can point the mouse to any NPC in the game, including your premade chars, and press CTRL + Q . It will add that NPC to your party

Thanks, I might need that along the way

CaptainTingTang

alceryes said:

For some reason, immediately after being rescued, Dynaheir always runs up the stairs behind her pit and attacks the three gnolls there with her fists - she's funny like that.

This made me chuckle

Thels

Another, slightly more tricky way to dispose of NPC pairs... Say you want to keep Minsc, but not Dynaheir, but you feel bad about leaving her in the Wilderness, and instead want to park her in the ground floor of the Friendly Arm Inn, so you can wave at her from time to time:

1. Recruit Minsc and Dynaheir.
2. Travel to Friendly Arm Inn outside area.
3. Have your party gather at the entrance, Dynaheir included.
4. Send Minsc a distance away from the entrance, then kick him from the party.
5. Before Minsc can talk to you, enter the Friendly Arm Inn.
6. Inside the Friendly Arm Inn, park Dynaheir somewhere nice, and place Charname next to her.
7. Kick Dynaheir from the party. Tell her goodbye.
8. Leave the Friendly Arm Inn. Minsc walks up to you. Tell him you want him in the party after all.
9. Enter the Friendly Arm Inn again. Dynaheir will be there, waiting and smiling, while Minsc is a happy party member.

CaptainTingTang

Thanks for all the tips. I've just got to Nashkel with my party, and I have to say, I think Beamdog have done an AMAZING job with BG:EE.

The zoom controls and auto-loot make a huge difference to the game, as well as being able to create a single player party. I also really like the breakdown of stats for AC, THACO etc.

I really liked the Neera encounter (and her nice Gem Bag). I'm planning to recruit Rasaad too once I've picked up Dynaheir and ditched her. Then my party will be full, with a nice balance of 3 PCs and 3 companions.

CaptainTingTang

Thels said:

Another, slightly more tricky way to dispose of NPC pairs... Say you want to keep Minsc, but not Dynaheir, but you feel bad about leaving her in the Wilderness, and instead want to park her in the ground floor of the Friendly Arm Inn, so you can wave at her from time to time:

1. Recruit Minsc and Dynaheir.
2. Travel to Friendly Arm Inn outside area.
3. Have your party gather at the entrance, Dynaheir included.
4. Send Minsc a distance away from the entrance, then kick him from the party.
5. Before Minsc can talk to you, enter the Friendly Arm Inn.
6. Inside the Friendly Arm Inn, park Dynaheir somewhere nice, and place Charname next to her.
7. Kick Dynaheir from the party. Tell her goodbye.
8. Leave the Friendly Arm Inn. Minsc walks up to you. Tell him you want him in the party after all.
9. Enter the Friendly Arm Inn again. Dynaheir will be there, waiting and smiling, while Minsc is a happy party member.

By the way, this doesn't work in v2.3. Re-entering the Friendly Arm with Minsc causes Dynaheir to automatically rejoin the party. I had to leave her in a nice safe cave

Thels

It works for me most of the time. On the very rare occasion she joins the group again, but that happened only like 1 in 10 times. Reloading the save just prior (auto-save) and entering again usually fixes it.

JDow

CaptainTingTang said:

But, it seems like you cannot drop a premade char from your party and recruit them again later on, they cannot be talked to. I like to do a lot of changing and moving party members around throughout the game and this bug would mean that my initial premade characters would need to be in my party throughout.

There's another way around this (I think).

At the point you need to drop one of your pre-made characters from your party, export that character. This saves the character with all their experience points and belongings.

When you want them back, save and reload the game and just before starting you'll get the party screen. You can add the saved character back again in the empty slot and you're good to go.

Thels

Tweaks Anthology also provides basic dialog to premade party members, so you can kick them and rehire them.

CaptainTingTang

Thanks, I'm happy with my party now so I won't be dropping them, I feel like I have 3 pc's this run

Really enjoying the EE, and am now in the city of Baldurs Gate. Just started Rasaad's new quest.

CaptainTingTang

So, Rasaad gets some nice bracers (+2 Thaco) from his quest, and a cursed belt (19 strength, 6 int).

I'm toying with the idea of using the cursed belt for the remainder of BG1 for Rasaad for the extra 3 strength. I have gauntlets of ogre power (18/00 STR) but using those will mean wasting his nice +2 thaco bracers that only Rasaad can use.

Will I have any issues gimping him to 6 INT?

PK2748

The only issue is the 6int doesn't reduce Rasaad to just grunting. Sadly he keeps speaking normally

JuliusBorisov

Other consequence is that with INT less than 9 he won't be able to use wands (including Wand of Heaven) and green protection scrolls.

CaptainTingTang

I'm currently enjoying the effects of 19 STR on him. He's actually not too bad at the level cap in BG now